A former Met Police officer who served in south London has pleaded guilty to several crimes related to sexual activity involving an underage girl.

In a statement published Thursday (April 22), a spokesperson for the Met Police said that an allegation of gross misconduct had been proven against former PC Mark Collins, who was arrested in November 2019 and resigned from the force in February this year.

Collins was arrested on November 26, 2019, and suspended from duty – he was later charged on the November 9, 2020.

 

The Met Police revealed Thursday that on January 27 Collins pleaded guilty to "six counts of attempting to communicate with a person aged under 16 years, for the purposes of sexual gratification and one count of attempting to incite a girl aged 13 to engage in sexual activity".

 

He is currently awaiting sentencing.

The Met said Collins was attached to the force's South Area command unit that includes Bromley, Croydon and Sutton.

A Special Case hearing was held yesterday presided over by Met Assistant Commissioner Helen Ball.

Ball "found the allegation proven and had PC Mark Collins still been a serving officer he would have been dismissed" the police statement read.

The news arrived just hours after a misconduct case was proven against another officer who previously served with the Met's south London unit. 

A Special Case Hearing for PC Dean Cupit, formerly based at South Area Command, took place on Wednesday (April 21).

Cupit previously pleaded guilty to a Section 2A offence under the Protection from Harassment Act 1979 [stalking].

That offence took place between April 2019 and October 2019.

At Guildford Crown Court last month (February 9) he was sentenced to an 18 month community order; 25 days of rehabilitation around stalking/harassment; 100 hours of unpaid work; and was order to pay £500 court costs fine and £95 victim surcharge.